


Four small things...

by spycandy



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Homeless Network
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-07
Updated: 2011-08-07
Packaged: 2017-10-22 08:29:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/236113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spycandy/pseuds/spycandy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four small things Sherlock did for the Homeless Network and one time they returned the favours</p>
            </blockquote>





	Four small things...

2009

1\. For once the strains of violin music drifted in through the open windows of his dingy bedsit, rather than out. The busker was not too bad, thought Sherlock, as he peered at another sample of silk fibres through his magnifying lens, they had a light touch and some enjoyable dramatic flourish.

For the previous hour, the player's repertoire had mostly consisted of run-of-the-mill popular classics, which drew plenty of spare change from passers-by if the jangling of coins was anything to go by. But that had abruptly shifted into what appeared to be a lively improvised flight of fancy.

However, there was something very peculiar indeed about the current playing style and musical phrasing. Sherlock laid the samples and his equipment on the table for a moment and listened with his eyes closed.

Oh! Of course!

He reached for a pale blue plastic bag, tucked under the table, behind the stack of Sunday newspapers and pulled out a small packet. He spared it a single glance to check the label, then flung it out of the window.

The music stopped. “What the... Where did...”

There was a long pause, in which only inane conversation and passing traffic could be heard. Eventually there was a quick pizzicato of notes, ending with several clear pure Ds.

Moments later, the busking violinist launched into yet another rendition of Vivaldi's _Autumn_. Tedious, thought Sherlock, but the rattle of coins immediately proved it was far more lucrative than the three-stringed inventive playing had been.

He turned back to the fibres, still half-listening to the music. If the busker deigned to play anything interesting during the afternoon, he'd cheerfully chuck down some spare rosin as well.

>>>

2\. When he returned from the morgue to collect his things from lab staffroom there was a muffin perched on top of the precarious pile of folders and notebooks he had left there. A post-it note was pasted beside it, emblazoned with a logo advertising an obesity conference in 2007, reading simply ‘For Sherlock’.

There was no one else in the staffroom to ask about the origins of the offering, but three crumb-coated discarded paper cases in the bin suggested that others had received similar homemade gifts.

Ever eager-to-please Molly was the obvious suspect for such a cake and run but the golden-brown muffin was not her style. He had seen her pause over the cakes in the canteen, and without fail she went for chocolate in the end, the darker the better. Of the other visitors to this room today, Cora was _obviously_ on a diet again, while medical students Simon and Dizzi lacked baking facilities in their digs.

That left... Mike Stamford. Interesting. Sherlock broke off a tiny fragment of the muffin top between his finger and thumb and sniffed it before tasting. Ginger – so it hadn’t been a trendy new unisex cologne that Mike had been wearing earlier. And the choice of post-it note was very much the man's idea of hilarity.

Mike was an improbable poisoner and abandoning the muffin would no doubt be seen as rude, so despite feeling far from hungry, Sherlock left it balanced atop his papers as he carried the whole precarious stack out of the hospital side doors. Maybe he would nibble it later.

“Mr Holmes!”

Tyrone was waiting outside, swaddled in a hideous orange puffa jacket. His worn jeans were soaked from the hems to halfway up his calves and he was shivering, but he still bounced up cheerfully with the news. “Five cars stopped at the warehouse. Four old bangers and one fucking gorgeous Alfa. I wrote down all the plates for you.”

“Thank you Tyrone,” said Sherlock, shifting the papers onto one hand while he pulled a £20 note from his pocket. The muffin slid sideways and the homeless young man sprang forward to rescue it from toppling onto the wet pavement.

“Keep it,” said Sherlock.

>>>

3\. “I can't, like, afford to pay you or anything. But I could work it off! I can be anywhere you need eyes and ears. Just... Please, can you find Albert?”

It actually was an intriguing mystery, the first to present itself in a very dull week. Who would steal a homeless man's dog? It wasn't as if Albert was a prize, being odd-looking, scrawny and barely house trained. But the animal was utterly loyal to his odd-looking, scrawny master, who lacked any kind of home for training in.

“Very well Joe,” said Sherlock. “Lead me to the scene of the crime.”

Ten minutes later they stood in the recessed doorway of a fancy soap shop. “It's a prime spot,” said Joe. “Well out of the wind _and_ it smells good.”

“So you bedded down here, in your green sleeping bag, with a bottle of disgustingly cheap cider, several Evening Standards – for reading or for lumbar support? -- and Albert curled up by your feet.”

“Both, I have trouble with my back on hard concrete, but I always read the sports section first. Hold on, how...”

Sleeping bag, cider bottle and newspapers were all now just as absent as the dog, of course, but each had left its traces. “And when you woke up, Albert was gone.”

“He'd never leave me. That dog had stuck with me through everything.”

“He didn't run off of his own accord,” said Sherlock. “See here on the pavement. He tried to resist being dragged away from you.”

“Aw, aint that something?” said Joe. “Such a good dog.”

“Stop being sentimental, it's distracting. Now where...”

The scratch marks gave a very general sense of the dog-knappers initial direction. They'd clearly crossed the road, but then what? Oh! Above the shops opposite Joe's doorway were several storeys of flats. Sherlock studied the windows, one by one.

“Third floor, second flat from the end,” he said, striding across the road towards the panel of door buzzers. His usual daft neighbour act gained him access within a record 40 seconds and he ran up the stairs, with Joe trailing after in awe.

On the third floor, he hammered at the door of the suspect's flat and was rewarded with the sound of skittering animal feet and a female voice calling, “Bad dog! Hold on, I'm coming!”

When the door opened, Albert clearly saw his chance and made a bolt for it, straight into his master's waiting arms.

“What do you... Oh!”

“Yes, I think we have everything we came for,” Sherlock told the shocked woman. “Next time you feel the need to do some do-gooding, maybe consider some warm food for your neighbour Joe here, rather than misguidedly “rescuing” his dog to feed it up.”

As Sherlock strode back down the corridor towards the stairs, he could already hear the woman stammering apologies and an invitation to come inside for lunch. He'd rather thought that might be the result, given all the charitable stickers in her window.

>>>

4\. There was something in the way that the young woman eyed the crisp £50 notes as he pulled them from his wallet that made Sherlock hesitate just a fraction. Oh, she had earned the money fair and square, long hours dressed in that skimpy outfit, turning potential customers away while the detective in the shadows logged the cars that slowed as they passed. She could probably have made a lot more tonight than she would by taking his cash.

It certainly wasn't his place to tell her how to spend it, to offer patronising advice on clinics and rehab and getting the hell out of that vicious circle. She was entitled to her own bad decisions, just as he had been entitled to his.

He wanted no part of smug middle-class voices muttering about how giving 'them' money only fed habits, supported criminals, made matters worse. Yet still he found himself swallowing a plea to at least spend some of the money on a coat, on a warm meal, on a safe place to stay.

“Hannah...”

“Thanks Mr H. Easiest night I've had in ages,” she said, holding out a hand for the cash. “You ever want to lurk and watch me not work again, just let me know.”

He smiled at her as he pressed the money into her hand. Then, on a whim, he shrugged off his short grey woollen jacket and wrapped it around the shivering girl's shoulders. He'd been planning to buy a new coat anyway – a long blue one had caught his eye just a few days earlier.

Smug middle class voices at the back of his mind muttered, _she'll only sell it_ as he walked away.

>>>

And 1.

There were times, noted Sherlock, as the smooth blue wooden wall loomed in front of him, when out-of-date knowledge was more dangerous than no knowledge at all. Thanks to the brand new construction site security hoardings, what would have been a clever and confusing short cut through mews and back alleys just a week ago, had become a deadly trap.

He glanced around in an urgent search for escape routes, but the walls were tall and flat and even the drainpipes were modern, non-weight-bearing plastic. Dratted crime prevention officers.

Five against one was not likely to go well, especially when the five boasted such charming and carefully thought out nicknames as 'Smasher' and 'Fists'.

Give them their due though, they didn't waste time on gloating. Your average hired thug would have had a few choice words to say about detectives who ran into dead ends – giving Sherlock time to identify any weaknesses or goad them into an error. But the Johnston Gang simply clocked their geographic and numeric advantage and set about a sound beating.

He liked to think he'd got a few useful blows in – at least cost one of the gang a tooth or a rrotten headache. That was certainly how he would, many hours later, optimistically interpret the deep bruising to the knuckles of his right hand. But the truth was that barely a few moments into the 'fight' a blow to the back of the head sent him reeling.

After that, it was mostly just pain, although he couldn't help observing that the cushion-toed sports brand trainers of one of his assailants were particularly unsuited for delivering a good kicking. He was concentrating on this discovery when distant shouting – and the barking of a dog – interrupted the onslaught.

“Oi!”

“Come back here Albert!”

“What the fuck's going on!”

“Gerroutofere! Yeah go on! Run for it! This is our... oh, bloody hell.”

“Fuck, that's Mr H.”

“Is he alright?”

“Nah, don't look it. You got any minutes to call an ambo?”

“Don't need minutes for 999.”

“Okay. I'm calling now.”

The voices were familiar. The dog licking his face was very familiar. And the warm weight of the wool jacket placed over his shoulders was most familiar of all.

He tried to raise his head and look around him, to confirm who exactly was gathered in the dead end, but that only made everything spin in a whirl of pain.

“Just you stay still Mr Holmes,” said Tyrone, patting him on the upper arm. “Let us look after you.”


End file.
